sign in sign up
<<
Home , A228 road, Snodland

HOLBOROUGH A Hill and a Hollow

Holborough is part of the parish of . In a charter purporting to date from 838 AD it is called Holanbeorge. The old English beorge denotes a hill or mound, especially a burial mound, while Hol correspondingly refers to a hollow. The hill, alas, is no more, having been quarried for its chalk in the fifty years or so from the 1920s to the 1970s.

Rather more than 200 feet high and separate from the main range of the it was attractive to early inhabitants as a special place. At its summit they created a prehistoric ring ditch with a diameter of about 100 feet.1 It is thought that this ditch was perhaps part of the construction of a round barrow, which formerly incorporated a mound or bank. No trace of a burial was found at the centre of the circle, which may originally have been laid directly on to the chalk at ground level and have been dispersed later as the ground was ploughed and re-ploughed. Some bones found in the ditch may be human, suggesting that there was a secondary burial. The uppermost layers of the ditch contained various types of pottery fragments ranging from the Late Bronze Age (around 1000 BC) to Roman times.2 Confirmation that there were people living at Holborough so early came during an archaeological survey by the Archaeological Trust in 2004-5, funded by Berkeley Homes prior to housing development, in a cornfield near the main road.3 A major round-house building was identified, and post holes elsewhere showed other circular, square and retangular structures. Some of these were probably for storing grain and evidence suggested the community grew cereals and vegetables. Animal bones showed they also kept livestock. Baked clay loomweights and a bone weaving tool were for making textiles, so sheep must have been present. Beside field boundary ditches, three cremation burials and ten pits containing cremated human bone were sited away from the domestic area and the pits for domestic rubbish. The most exciting find, however, was a group of clay mould fragments for the casting of a Bronze sword manufactured approximately 3000 years ago. An expert at the British Museum has reported that the assemblage represents one of the best-known of its kind and is of

1 See V. I. Evison, ‘An Anglo-Sxon Cemetery t Holborough, ’, Archeaologia Cantiana, LXX (1956), 84-141 2 See R. F. Jessup, N. C. Cook and J. M. C. Toynbee, ‘Excavations of a Roman Barrow at Holborough, Snodland’, Archaeological Cantiana, LXVIII (1955), 1-61. 3 Canterbury Archaeologiccal Trust, ‘Holborough Quarry, Snodland. Proposed Residential Development Evaluation (Excavation) centered on TQ 70256235’; ‘Grey Report’: 2004/46: June 2004. 1 national importance.4 The Romans arrived in in AD 43. One theory is that they crossed the river at Snodland before a great battle with the English near Rochester. They soon settled in the area and many Roman remains have been found in the district. At Snodland a substantial villa was built, perhaps to keep an eye on the river crossing, and other buildings there may have served as a distribution centre for the district. The villa flourished from the second to the fourth centuries. Excavations have been made here periodically for nearly 200 years, but much has been destroyed by later industrial and domestic building and today nothing can be seen above ground. A considerable number of Roman burials have come to light near the villa, but a second barrow was created by the Romans on the hill at Holborough. Presumably this was a prestigious burial demanding special treatment. The site chosen was close to the prehistoric ring-barrow. In August 1844 the archaeologist Thomas Wright spent four days digging a trench through the tumulus, but found relatively little.5 When excavated in 1954 the barrow revealed that the body of a man, probably about 40 years old - possibly an important official of Rochester – had been carried here. A funeral pyre was set up just to the south of the burial site and he was cremated, possibly sitting on a bronze-mounted folding stool with a metal-fringed cushion, which was later buried in the barrow. Some glass vessels were also put in the fire and these fused in the great heat. Also placed on the pyre was an old coin, appropriately showing a cremation on its reverse side. A grave was dug and a temporary wooden hut was built over the spot, perhaps to afford shelter during the funeral ceremony. This included the ritual smashing of a group of five jars (amphorae). The man's ashes were placed in a wooden coffin together with some of the chalk which had been removed to make the grave itself. A libation of wine or oil was offered and a feast (which included a fowl) was held. Later the remains were collected and buried, mostly in special pits. A dome of chalk and turf was erected above the grave and a larger mound covered the whole, rising to 11 feet above the original surface. The barrow was surrounded by an oval ditch and bank. The pottery remains suggest that all this occurred in the first quarter of the third century A.D. Before long, however, the mound was partially re-opened at its southern extremity to receive the burial of a small child, aged about one, in a fine lead sarcophagus (now in Museum). Presumably this was a relative - perhaps a child or grandchild - of the man for whom the barrow was made. Within the sarcophagus with the body, which had not been cremated, was the remains of a purse - a luxury item suggesting the child had come from a wealthy family. This sarcophagus has been described as the most interesting found at any Romano-British site, because of its decoration of scallop shells and Dionysiac figures, which were symbolic representations of the after-life in Roman Mediterranean art. It seems likely that the maker was relatively local, but used a 'pattern-book' imported from abroad for

4 See Canterbury Archaeological Trust Annual Report, 2004-5, 41-42. 5 T. Wright, ‘Wanderings of an Antiquary: VII: The Valley of Maidstone, Kit’s Coty and the Cromlechs around’, from The Gentleman’s Magazine, December 1852, 564-571, reprinted as SHS Pamphlet No. 1, 1997. 2 the design. The use of such figures was widespread in Roman times and does not necessarily imply that the Snodland family was especially devoted to the worship of Dionysius. No doubt this was the same burial noted by William Lambarde, in the second edition of his Perambulation of Kent (1596), where he writes: 'As touching that Holboroe (or rather Holanbergh) it lieth in Snodland...and tooke the name of Beorgh, or the Hill of buriall, standing over it; in throwing downe a part whereof (for the use of the chalke) my late Neighbour, Maister Tylghman discovered in the very Centre thereof, Urnam cineribus plenam, an earthen pot filled with ashes, an assured token of a Romane Monument...'

The prehistoric ring ditch was at the summit of the hill. The Roman tumulus was in the clump of trees on the right. A Saxon cemetery was between the two barrows. Roman rule declined in the area after the third or fourth centuries, and it is quite possible that cultivated areas then became overgrown. Yet the river crossing would continue to bring people to Holborough and Snodland, so there was always a likelihood that some would take up residence, however temporary, close by. In 1952, continued chalk quarrying revealed a cemetery of 39 graves between the prehistoric and Roman barrows. Others had already been lost to the diggers, but a full investigation of those remaining was carried out.6 Apart from one infant grave, all were lying with the head to the west. As occurs in other locations, it seems likely that the Bronze Age barrow was deliberately chosen as the site for these burials. The cemetery gradually spread from the first graves, dug into the prehistoric barrow, north and east down the slope. Some burials were in lidless wooden coffins and some had grave goods buried with them: buckles, shields, spears, swords, knives, bowls and other utensils, and pottery. It has been suggested that some of the finds, especially two buckles, indicate a Christian connection for these people. One buckle has a cross similar to known Christian forms of the time, the other has a bird motif which compares with another from with a fish - also a Christian symbol. In 604 Justus had been ordained as the first by Augustine and a small church dedicated to St. Andrew was built in the city - later enlarged to become the cathedral - so Christianity was already established in the area. The cemetery was begun in the seventh century and continued into the next, to serve a group of settlers living at Holborough. It cannot have continued for too long, judging by its relatively small extent. The finds can all be dated to a span of some fifty years, but the later burials had no grave-goods in them. So the hill was a place for the dead, where the barrows were sited beside an ancient

6 See Vera I. Evison, ‘An Anglos-Saxon Cemetery at Holborough Kent’, Archaeologica Cantiana LXX (1956), 84-141. 3 trackway. This had run along the foot of the escarpment at the spring-line, through and Paddlesworth, but it deviated here to run down to the river, crossing at Holborough to run south-east past the numerous megalithic monuments towards Boxley. Higher up, the track now called the Pilgrim's Way ran on through to cross the river at Rochester. On the hills above Paddlesworth it was once joined by an even higher route which ran along the summit of the Downs. It seems likely that these ways were used by Early Man to move himself and his animals - much as still occurs in some primitive parts of Europe today. Shepherds and sheep would keep to the highest routes, while the cattle would need the water-bearing springs at the lower level. Both would be able to move more easily in these less-densely wooded areas above the heavy Gault Clay and Greensand levels.

To live requires water and the 'hollow' part of Holborough is blessed with a spring and a stream of very pure water which runs into the . Indeed the eighteenth- century historian Edward Hasted tells of a plan to pipe the water from Holborough to the Medway Towns: Sir John Marsham, bart., and Sir Charles Bickerstaff, had a design of supplying the towns of Stroud, Rochester, and Chatham with fresh water by bringing it from the spring rising at the foot of Holborough hill, and others thereabouts, by a cut or channel through Halling and Cuxton thither, four miles of which was through Sir John Marsham's own lands, but after they had proceeded two miles, finding some obstructions, which could not be removed, but by an act, this was procured for the purpose in the 1st year of James II [1685-6], but nothing further was afterwards done for it, for what reason does not appear.7 King and Bishop Originally all land belonged to the King and he was able to freely give it to whomsoever he wished. Two charters state that first, in 838, King Egbert gave four ploughlands in Snoddingland and Holanbeorge to the then Bishop of Rochester, Beornmodo, and in 1841 his son Ethelwulf added two more ploughlands at Holanbeorge. It is now thought that these two charters are forgeries made by the monks at Rochester to ensure they acquired the title of the land, but the monks may simply have changed the signatories rather than the contents. After the Norman Conquest,

7 Edward Hasted, The History & Topographical Survey of the County of Kent (Second Edition, Canterbury, 1798); transcribed in SHS pamphket no. 6, Snodland, 1998. 4 King William confirmed the gift to Gundulph, Bishop of Rochester, of a manor extending from Holborough through Halling to Cuxton. Odo, Bishop of Bayeux, was given the adjacent manors of Pottins and Paddlesworth and what we now called Whitedyke Road ran between the manors to divide them. Although the Bishop collected his dues from his land, he sub-let it; for much of the recorded history of the Manor of Halling the Dalison family controlled it and they in turn sub-let it to other householders. A Church or Chapel Until the mid-nineteenth century it would appear that the hamlet of Holborough was similar in size to the village of Snodland. From time to time we hear of a church or chapel there, but there is some doubt that an independent building was ever built or finished. In 1364 Henry de Scortnye was appointed to the chaplaincy of St Andrew’s, Holborough. This suggests he was perhaps appointed to serve in the main house, which might have kept a room or space for a chapel. No more is heard of this, but in his will of 19 September 1471 Geoffrey Alisander wrote ‘I give and bequeath to the chapel of the blessed virgin Mary at Holboro half a quarter of Barley’. (The barley would have been sold and the money set apart for the chapel.) A little later on 13 November 1487 his niece Margaret Bischoptre similarly made provision: ‘Item I beqveth to the edifying & byildyng of our lady chapell in holborow in the seyde pishe of Snodlande 40s. To be payde wen eny p[er]son or p[er]sons begynyth to bilde And to pforme hett.’ Both Geoffrey and Margaret had inherited the main estate of Holloway and the farm of Nasshenden. On 15 March 1486 Richard Stock bequeathed his property to his wife Margaret for life, but after her death it was to be sold and the proceeds to be given to repairs of Snodland church and to ‘our lady chapel in Holborough’. The will of Richard Tilghman on 14 October 1518 again leaves produce ‘to a stok to mayten a light before the Image of ower ladie in the chapell of holborow,’ so some kind of chapel seems to have been in use then and Joan Usher, bequeathed 3s. 4d. ‘to our ladie of holboro in Snodeland parish’. It would have been disolved a few years later at the time of the Reformation. With the growth of Snodland in the nineteenth century a need for a chapel at Holborough again surfaced. A temporary ‘Mission Room’ was given by Mrs Anne Roberts around 1880, but she died on 18 May 1881. Her son William Henry Roberts paid for a new Room and this was formally opened on 17 November 1882 (and the old one pulled down). It was sited where the office block is situated today. By 1887 there were weekly evening services on Fridays and Sundays and Holy Communion twice a month. As many as six choir boys sang there. The Mill8 There has been a mill at Holborough from earliest times and it is recorded in the first documents. For most of its life it was in the control of the Bishop of Rochester and all dues had to be paid to him. In 1323 Hamo, the then Bishop, had it newly built with timber from Perstede (presumably Bearsted). The earliest person named as miller in the records is Henry Scrivener, who died in 1477, although we cannot be sure that he was at Holborough rather than Snodland. He had a house and land at , which he left to his wife Alice. We next hear of a lease of Holborough Mill from the Bishop to Robert Fysher, for 99 years from 4

8 A full account of the mill is given in Michael Fuller, Snodland and Holborough Watermills, Snodland Historical Society Pamphlet 9, Snodland, 1998, where many more details will be found. 5 January 1516 at 40s. a year.9 In 1540 he considered himself prosperous enough to describe himself as a ‘gentilman’. It seems that William Tylghman had the lease of the mill during the later sixteenth century, although he himself was not the miller. Between at least 1583 (when he married) and 1590 John Powlter was the miller, but sadly four of his children died under the age of five years, including Deborah, daughter of John Powlter, miller, ‘wch was drowned in the mill pond at Holborough.’ By a lease of 31 May 1606 William, Byshop of Rochester for and in consideration of the sume of thirty pounds ... hath demised granted and farme letten ... all that said watermyll called holborough myll in Snodland ... To have and to hold ... during the naturall lifes of John Giles and William Giles & Isabell Giles daughter of the said William Giles ...’ William Giles the elder died in 1614, bequeathing the lease of the mill in tail to his son William, son John and daughter Isabel (who had married Thomas Short in 1610). He had lands in East Malling, Birling and Snodland, as well as a hoy called Thomas. He was a churchwarden at Snodland in 1600-01. The younger William Giles died in January 1616, so John (d.1620) took over the mill. On 11 December 1617 he leased the mill to John Amisse for 31½ years,10 who on 25 February 1628 married John’s widow Ann. Amisse received a further lease of 43 acres of land for 21 years in 1631 and had previously paid taxes on behalf of his [step]son John Gyles. He probably died during the Commonwealth, when the church registers were not kept. By 1662 the mill was occupied by John Lambe, who himself died in 1667. Between these two years the church registers are full of burials of members of the Lambe family, including four wives of a John Lambe (1662, 1663, 1664 and 1666). One of these at least probably relates to his son John. Lambe seems to have been succeeded by Stephen Roberts, who married Mary Savage on 18 January 1668. He certainly signed a lease for the mill in 1671 for a period of 21 years, the Bishop of Rochester having sub-let the mill to the Dallison family of Halling as part of his Manor. Another document of 1684 mentions that Roberts had a partner, Daniel Richards the Younger, but no more is known about him. Although there is another lease to Richard Collins of Cuxton for five years (1684-1689), Roberts may have continued to work the mill and he was still there when he died in 1693. Curiously, having left his estate to his three sons, other relatives received ‘old clothes and not money’ from him. The various leases give useful technical descriptions of the equipment at the mill which was producing various kinds of flour. John Curd appears to have taken over the mill after Roberts. His first wife Elizabeth died in 1695 and it was not until 9 June 1720 that he married again. This was at Teston, to Mary Rumney, although both bride and groom were from Snodland. Sadly he died that December and four months later his widow Mary married George Courthope at St Margaret’s, Rochester. So as with Giles and Amisse (noted above) the widow found a husband who could work the mill. They had three children: Elizabeth (1721-62), George (1723-8), and Peter (1725-46). Mary Courthope died in 1728 and in 1733 George married Margaret Scarmer of Meopham, at St Margaret’s, Rochester. It is not clear when they left Snodland, but the manorial records cease to name George in 1736, so it was probably then. George leased the mill for 15 years. The family moved to , where Elizabeth lived with her husband William How, succeeded by six

9 KHLC: U522/T61, recorded in a lease of 31 May 1607. 10 KHLC: U522/T61, a bundle of deeds incuding those subsequently mentioned. 6 children and numerous grandchildren. George made provision for some of the latter in his will with the rents from a house occupied by a butcher, but this was so dilapidated that a sale of it was agreed instead. For the rest of the century the mill seems to have been leased to members of the Crispe family, but evidence is sparse concerning which ones. It is likely that they were working the mill after the Courthopes and a ‘Crispe of Holborough’ was there in 1741. Either (or both) Edward and William were the millers and William’s son Thomas took over around 1779 until his death in 1800. From 1802 until 1837 the mill was managed by James Martin and then until 1847 by his son Edward. James had moved here from Birling, where his daughter Harriet had been born in 1801, and in 1834 she married the pioneering and adventurous naval man Thomas Fletcher Waghorn, grandson of her neighbour John Goodhugh. Robert Whitby was miller in 1851, so may have succeeded James Martin, but by 1859 he had been replaced by George Stedman. In 1867 the miller was James Field, but he died in September that year, leaving his wife Anne to continue, presumably with help. By 1873 she was struggling and sought liquidations of the business,11 but evidently she was able to continue and in 1878 she had gone into partnership with Edward Wood. The partnership wasa dissolved in May 1881 and Wood then continued in sole occupation. Wood also had a ‘baker and seed shop’ in the High Street. Evidently he struggled to make a living and the mill rent of £120 a year was reduced to £100 in 1886, but he fell into arrears and a court case resulted and he left at the end of 1890. He was buried at Snodland on 4 April 1895, aged 62. The last miller was Walter Henry Cooke, who is named between 1894 and 1909. The building came into the hands of the cement company, who from time to time have used it in various ways, as restaurant, store, and exhibition space. HOLLOWAY COURT Among the families known to have lived in Snodland in early times, that called ‘Holloway’ is prominent. It presumably took its name from ‘Hollow Way’ and must for some time have owned the property at Holborough latterly called ‘Holloway Court’. This was a house situated slightly to the north-west of the mill, and separated from it by the road leading up to the Pilgrim’s Way. (In later years this road was replaced by ‘New Road’, now called ‘Ladd’s Lane’.) There are recorded: Thomas Holeweye and John Holeweye, brothers (1288); William de Holoway (active 1302-1305); Walter Holeweye (active 1330-1338); William Holeway (active 1327-1352); his wife Joan died in 1348; Richard Holeweye (active 1327-1349), a priest, instituted to Halling vicarage in 1349; John (the elder), (active from 1442) died 1478. Wife: Dionisia; son: John; grandchildren: Thomas, Walter, Joan, Alison. By the 1460s this John Holway also owned ‘Newhouse’ (which we know as ‘Woodlands Farm’) and other properties. A seventeenth century list of deeds records this and notes the transfer of ownership of his houses and lands between 1468 and 1522. Meanwhile by 1469 the farm called ‘Holloway’ had passed to William Alisander. Alisander. There is no evidence that Thomas and Alice Alisander, parents of William, had any connection with Snodland. William first appears in 1449 as a witness to the

11 Times and Herne By Herld, 19 April 1873. 7 will of John Bamburgh, one of the wealthiest local men, who lived at Starkey Castle, Wouldham. In his own will William appointed as an overseer his ‘master’ John Lowe, Archdeacon of Rochester, under whom he may have had religious or legal training, and he acted as executor to John Aston, Rector of Snodland (d.1453) and other parishioners. The soul of another John Lowe, ‘late Bishop of Rochester’ (d.1467), is included with those of William’s family for whom the Rector of Snodland was to pray after William’s death. There follows a whole succession of communities, all of whom were to pray for the same souls. In reward they were bequeathed richly made gifts: The Rector of Snodland: ‘one small and beautiful book of pleas and dirges’ The Prior and Community of Augustinian Friars in : ‘a little silver cup weighing 5¼ ounces’ The Carmelite Brothers of : ‘a large bowl weighing 14 ounces’ John Avney, Prior of Christ Church, Canterbury: ‘a gold ring with a sapphire stone set in it.’ The Community there: ‘a chased silver gilt cup with a gilded silver cover, weighing 26 silver Troy ounces’ The Lady Abbess of Malling: ‘a chased silver cup weighing 14 ounces’ The Prioress of Higham: ‘a chased silver cup weighing 14 ounces’ The Rector of Stone: ‘a cup of maple covered with gem-stones with silver and gilt weighing 16½ ounces.’ Richard Legat, priest at Snodland (c.1469-1478) and official to the Archdeacon of Rochester: ‘a bound white book called Tulius in multis with other contents in the same.’ Clearly William was very wealthy and had access to skilled craftsmen able to create these fine cups. By his will, dated 15 January 1470, he asked to be buried in the porch of Snodland church. The large stone in front of the inner door may be his grave and it is likely that the brass indent on the east wall above is also his. Details of the inscription and arms were noted by John Weaver in his Ancient Funeral Monuments (1631) and by John Philipot, Somerset Herald, around the same time. Curiously, there is no mention in his will of his charity (still announced on the charity board in the church) providing a weekly portion of bread to the poor ‘for ever’. The Alisander family may have moved to Snodland from the area, but records of them are very sparse. The wills of William and his son Geoffrey enable us to construct a family tree: ALISANDER Thomas = Alice | William = Elizabeth (d.1470) ____|______| | | Geoffrey = Joan William = ? Richard = Juliane (d.1471) | (d.before 1471) ______| ______| Margaret Ysabel | Katherine Margaret = Edward Bischoptre (d.1487) (d.1487) ______|______Emma John William

This is useful in determining what happened to ‘Holloways’ and to the adjacent farm

8 called ‘Nasshenden’. William bequeathed ‘to Geoffrey my son all household goods, beds and bedlinnen, etc., which I have in my tenements of holweys and nasshynden, with all ironwork and other instruments which I have in the forge of Robert Parmenter’ (who clearly was the blacksmith). His son William received ‘my entire white bed (in Nasshynden) dyed with flowers’; Juliane had ‘a dress of red russet decorated with silver and gilt’; her daughter Margaret acquired silver spoons and a bed. Geoffrey did not long survive his father. He made his will on 19 September 1471, describing himself as ‘gentleman’. His property in Snodland, Halling, Paddlesworth and was to go to his daughter Katherine once she reached the age of fourteen; in the meantime his brother William was to receive the rents. Katherine was also to receive all his moveable goods, cattle and jewels. Sadly, it seems likely that she died before her fourteenth birthday, for, in the event of her death, the will made provision for the property to descend to others who can be shown to have owned it. If Katherine died, wrote Geoffrey, Margaret Bischoptre ‘shall have my tenement ... at Holbergh ... called Nasshinden’ (with about 25 acres of land), while brother William ‘shall have my tenement at Holbergh which was formerly John Olwey’s [= Holoway’s]’, its land and another cottage. Of William Alisander the younger we hear nothing more, but Margaret Bischoptre made a will on 13 November 1487, three days before her death. She was then living at Addington. (Her husband Edward had died on 1 September and both are commemorated in a fine brass in the north aisle of All Saints church.) Her son William was to inherit the Snodland property at the age of 22 years, but in the event of his death, her executors were authorised to sell it. Again, this seems to have come to pass and we next hear of Holloway and Nasshenden as belonging to the Tilghman family.12 Tilghman. John Philipott’s Villare Cantianum (published after his death in 1659) includes the following (p.322): ’There is a second seat in Snodland called Holoway Court, and in the Book of Aid mention is made of one Henry de Holoway that held it in elder times, about the beginning of Henry the Third, but upon a serious perusal of the evidences and muniments which did relate to this Mansion, I found it, as high as they reached, that is to the reign of Edward the Third, to be the Inheritance of the Tilghmans; and several very old Panes of Glasse are coloured with that Coat of Arms which the Tilghmans are entered with in the last Visitation of Kent [1619], and in this Name was the Possession for many Descents permanent till some forty years since or more it was by sale conveyed to Clotworthy.’ Philipot’s statements cannot be dismissed lightly. Clearly he visited the families in drawing up the 1619 Visitation and presumably took the opportunity to consult documents held by them. Unfortunately we do not know what these were so far as Holloway Court is concerned, but those currently known indicate a somewhat different state of affairs. Elizabeth Tillman found that the family originated in Norfolk before establishing bases in the West Country and in Kent. In the fourteenth century Tilghmans were living in Pluckley and it is here that we must seek the origins of the Snodland branch. She suggests that Philipott may not have looked too closely at names on the deeds in the Tilghman chest and that it is likely that the early ones derived from previous families. Such lists of Snodland parishioners as have come down to us (particularly tax returns), and other early documents like wills, indicate that we need search no earlier than the

12 A full account of the Tilghman family is Elizabeth M. Tillman, Getting to the Roots of the Family Tree: The Story of a Saxon Family, Bowie, Maryland, 1997 (3 vols.). I corresponded with her over many years and acknowledge her valuable help and work. 9 late fifteenth century to find when the Tilghmans came to Snodland. The key figure is a William Tilghman who died in London in 1493/4. This man held the post of Clerk to the Privy Council and thus was among the most important ‘civil servants’ of his day. Official documents, beautifully written by him, are preserved in the Public Record Office. Miss Tillman traced his activities to as early as 1446, so he must have been an old man at his death. His will shows him to have been a prosperous man, a pupil of Thomas Kent, one of the founders (with John Kent) of a Chantry in Headcorn Church in 1466. He requested that he be buried in the church of St. James Garlickhithe and clearly he was, for John Stowe recorded a monument to ‘William Tiligham’ in his Survay of London of 1598. He appears to have died childless, for none are mentioned in his will, and it was his nephew William to whom he bequeathed land in Snodland, Halling, Paddlesworth and Birling: I will and ordeyne...that...my...feoffees at such tyme as they shall be desirid or required on the behalf of my godson William Tilghman the younger, oon of the soones also of the said Thomas my said brother, shall make or do to be made unto the same William or unto such p[er]sons as he will thanne assigne a sufficiant estate in the law of and in all my landes and tenements, be made unto the same William or unto such p[er]sons as he will thanne assigne a sufficiant estate in the law of and in all my landes and tenements, rentes, medowes, pasture, leses and woodes wt [with] their appurtennces sett lying and beying as well in the p[ar]ish of Snodland, Hallyng and Paddellesworth as in the p[ar]ish of byrling in the said countie of Kent, to have and to hold the same londes and ten[emen]ts, rentes, medowes and pastures, leses and woodes wt their appurtennances unto the said Willm Tilghman and to his heires and assignes forev’more condicionally as it folowyng that the same Willm Tilghman the younger his heires and assignes shall kepe or do to be kept yerely from that tyme forth during the terme of 80 yeres thence next ensuing in the said parish church of Snodland an obite solemply by note after salisbury use for my soule and the soules of margarett late my wiff and of Thomas Saundre sumtyme her husband and for all cristen soules att such tyme of the yere as it shall fortune me to departe out of this wreched worlde expendying in the said obite so yerely to be kept as above to preestes, clerkes, children, almes to poure people, bred, ale, chese, wax and Rynging of belles to the sexteyne durying the said terme of 80 yeres by the oversight of the p[ar]son there or of his deputee there for the tyme beyng 4s. One’s impression from the will is that William Tilghman of London considered that Pluckley rather than Snodland was his home: he bequeathed an altar cloth and book to the church there, he left money for the keeping of a yearly obit and for a priest, and virtually all his other bequests of land were in that parish. Tilghmans continued to live in and around Pluckley for some considerable time thereafter. Nevertheless, together with his nephew, William had bought land in Birling from ‘John Boteler of Snodland’ on 7 October 1489 and the will shows this was just part of a larger holding in the area. The seventeenth century list previously mentioned also records that John Holway conveyed his properties to Bennet Phillip and others in 1468 (one of whom may have been William Alisander) and that these had passed to William Tilghman the younger by 1504/5. More was added as time went on. Enough evidence survives to show that William Tilghman the nephew settled in Snodland, establishing himself as one of the principal parishioners. By the late fifteenth century he was a churchwarden and he is mentioned in several wills: John Andrew 1491; Margery Canon 1503; Andrew Berrard 1505; John Ussher 1522; John Taylor 1527; Walter Stonyng 1532; Agnes Stonyng 1540. Tax lists for 1524 and 1538 show him to have been among the most prosperous villagers. He was married twice: first to Isabel, daughter of Thomas Avery, and second to Joan Amherst. A brass memorial now in the South aisle of All Saints church, Snodland, records them: Pray for the soules of William Tilghman thelder & Isabell & Joane his wyves, which William decssyd the xxvij day of August ano dni MCCCCCXLI, on whose soules Jesu have mercy.

10 As you ar so was I, and as I am so shall you be. The memorial also incorporates the Tilghman arms. William’s will shows that he leased the mill and forge at Holborough from the Bishop of Rochester and that he farmed much of the land in the village. William’s son and heir, Richard (of Snodland), had died in 1518. Richard was married twice according to the Visitation. His first wife was the daughter of William Pordage, his second was Julian[a] Newman. Two sons, Thomas and William are mentioned in his will, but further references to Thomas have not been traced among the Snodland records and he may have lived elsewhere. William, on the other hand, succeeded his grandfather in the Snodland estates and developed them further. He married four times and some of the first entries in the Snodland church registers refer to his growing family. The Tilghmans were undoubtedly the most prosperous and important land-owners in the parish at this time and when William made his will in 1593 he incorporated a long list of houses and lands which he had acquired, the rents of which mostly passed to his fourth wife Susan. He was careful to attach certain of these to the tenement called Nasshenden ‘where I now dwell’ and others to ‘Hollwayes’. He concluded: my minde and desire ys that the litle mesuage and garden at Holberth in the parishe of Snodland nowe devided into twoe dwellinges wherein widow Blacke and Johane Valentyne do nowe inhabit and dwell shall allwayes be ymployed as an Almeshouse to the use of the poore for ever by my said wife or such myne heir as shall from tyme to tyme inherit my mansion house wherein I nowe dwell and that she or such heir shall allwayes nominate and appoynte twoe poore persons to have theire severall dwellinges therein paying none other Rent to my sayed wife or heir but only twoe pence yerelie which cometh to a penny a peece for the Lordes rent therof. No other reference to these almshouses has come to light. Indeed, the picture of the Tilghmans, who are well documented in wills and deeds of the sixteenth century, now becomes somewhat blurred. In the latter part of his life William Tilghman lived at Nashenden Farm and Holloway’s was occupied by Roger Mosse (d.1573) Susan Tilghman, assured of a steady income from the rents, perhaps continued to live in Snodland, although she died at her family home in in 1619. She is listed in a Snodland tax assessment of 27 March 1613, but was only valued at a quarter of the amount charged to Edward (1542-1611), William’s eldest son by his first wife, Mary. The outcome of a lengthy court case between Susan and Edward concerning their respective inheritance of land in Snodland is not resolved by extant documents, but gives fascinating information about the family and its property. In particular it was said that William’s third wife Dorothy died of the plague, which had been brought to the house by a boy who had travelled with Edward from London. She was buried on 21 November 1572. Edward’s wife, Margaret (d.1613), came from the Brewer family of Ditton, and was bequeathed his estate with the proviso that she paid £14 a year to their son Francis for his maintenance. In 1610 Francis had already received a substantial amount of land and property in Snodland and Birling from the estate of his godfather, John Trevett. Probably Francis soon sold up, for on 15 June 1615 he married Margery Sprackling of Ellington-in-Thanet and they set up home in Sandwich. This would explain how about half of the Tilghman property in Snodland may have come into the hands of a London lawyer, Thomas Clottery of the Inner Temple, passing at his death in 1631 to his sister Elizabeth Williams and then to her son Thomas. He took up residence at Holborough with his wife Grace and records show the family here between 1659 and Thomas’s death in June 1672. In the meantime the lease of the mill ‘and the two little houses over against the said mill’ (could these have been the almshouses?) had been taken over by William Gyles (d.1614). The other half of the land descended to Susan Tilghman’s eldest son, Whetenhall, named after her family from Hextall’s Court at East Peckham. A 1634 map of the

11 Bishop’s manor of Halling shows fields occupied by ‘Mr Clottery’ and by ‘Mr Tillman’. A deed of 1 December 1640 transfers Whetenhall’s property, including the house in which he was then living, to his eldest son and heir, Isaac, and all this passed in turn to Isaac’s only daughter and heir Elizabeth, wife of Rev. Samuel Symonds of Murston, Kent. Finally, in 1682, she sold the farm of Nasshenden and the other land to Sir John Marsham of Whorne’s Place, Cuxton, who was gradually acquiring most of the land in the parish. Of the other sons of William, it is probable that Henry (b.1543) died young, for nothing further is heard of him. Similarly both boys called Lambert/Lambard, after William Lambarde the famous Halling lawyer and historian, died in infancy. Charles was buried at Snodland, aged 26, on 25 May 1608. Oswald moved to Wood Street, London and became a grocer and member of the Grocer’s Company. He made his will on 6 January 1629, desiring to be buried in the churchyard of St. Mary Abchurch. Three other children by his first wife are not mentioned and probably died young. Nor does he mention Richard, his infant son by Elizabeth his second wife. The latter would appear to have been orphaned in 1634 and his guardianship was entrusted to his step-sister Abigail during his minority. This Richard became a surgeon and married Mary Foxley. A daughter Mary was christened at St Olave, Hart Street, on 14 December 1656 and an unnamed infant of ‘Mr. Tilmans the chirugeon’ was buried at St. Dionisius Backchurch in 1661. Within the year Richard and his family were on the ship Elizabeth & Mary intent on starting a new life in Maryland.

Left. The brass of Edward and Margaret Bischoptre, 1487 Right. The brass of William Tilghman and his wife, 1540 [and 1547]

Manley and Coney. Sir Richard Manley is presumed to have acquired Holborough Court in 1672 following the death of Thomas Williams, but precise details are lacking. He had married Martha Faunce, a widow, at St Brides Fleet Street on 7 June 1660. When she made her will on 24 June 1675, they were living in the parish of St Margaret, Rochester; she did not die until 1682. Her memorial in All Saints church is thought to have been carved by Arnold Quellin (1653-1686), a partner of the more famous Grinling Gibbons.

12 Here lyeth the body of Martha, eldest daughter of John Baynard, late of Shorn, in the county of Kent, gent., first married to Bonham Faunce of St Margaret’s, Rochester, Kent, by whom she had issue which survived her, two daughters, viz., Mary, her eldest, married to William Man, of the , Esq., and Martha, her second daughter, married to John Cropley, of St. Margaret’s, Rochester, Esq. She was afterwards married to Richard Manley of Holloway Court, in this parish, Esq ., by whom also she left issue surviving her, viz., one son, Charles, and one daughter Frances. She died the 29th day of March, anno domini 1682, and in the 58th year of her age. Hoc monumentum amoris et pietatis ergo idem generi posuere. The three small shields are blank, but Thorpe adds information about four, now lost: By the sides of the said monument, are these arms, viz. I. Argent, a right hand couped sable, impaling sable a fesse between two chevrons Or. II. Or, a chevron ermine between three lions rampant sable, impaling argent three lions rampant sable, gorged with crowns Or. III. Argent, three lions rampant sable, each gorged with a crown Or, impaling sable a fesses between two chevrons Or. IV. Ermine, on a chief gules, three owls argent, impaling argent, three lions rampant sable, gorged with crowns Or. Two years later Sir Richard’s will bequeathed to their son Charles not only the Holborough estate but also property at Alkham, , St Margaret’s Rochester, and the lease of a manor held from the Archbishop of Canterbury. Their daughter Frances married Dr. Robert Coney of Rochester at Wouldham a week after Richard Manley was buried; she was then aged just 15. Edward Hasted traces ownership thereafter, but there is no evidence that any owners lived at Holloway Court until John May junior moved in around 1760. Hasted writes: He [Robert] sold Holloway court to Mr. John Conny, of Rochester, surgeon, son of Robert Conny, gent. of Godmanchester, in Huntingdonshire, and bore for his arms, Sable, a fess argent, cotized or, between three conies of the second. On whose decease his eldest son, Robert Conny, of Rochester, M.D. succeeded to it, and he sold it to Thomas Pearce, esq. a commissioner of the navy, whose three sons and coheirs, Thomas Best, and Vincent Pearce, conveyed it by sale to Mr. John May, and his eldest son, Mr. John May, of Holborough, in this parish, now possesses it. Dr Robert Conny (Bodleian Library, Oxford) A family history adds more details: John Conny, a surgeon in the British Navy and twice mayor of Rochester, county Kent, was a son of Robert

13 Conny of Godmanchester, Gent. He died in August, 1699, leaving an only son, Robert, born in 1655, who was educated at Magdalen College, Oxford, and admitted a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians. After practising his profession in that city for almost forty years, the younger Robert died on 25 May 1723, at the age of sixty-eight years, and was buried in St. Nicholas Church, Rochester. His wife died a few weeks before, and they had no children. There is a monument on the North wall of the church: VIRI ORNATISSIMI ROBERTI CONNY Apud Oxoniensis suos Doctoris in Medicina gradu honestati, Apud Londoniensis Collegii Regalis, Medicorum Sodalitio adscripti, lohannis Conny Chirurgi hujus civitatis bis Maioris Filii unici, Roberti Conny de Godmanchester, in Agro Huntingtoniensi, Gen. Nepotis, Hinc infra depositae sunt Exuviae; Quem vivum omnes amabant, fovebant, amplexabantur, Vita defunctum, nunc merito lugent. Etenim is erat, Qui candore, urbanitate, benevolentia, hospitio, Morum facilitate omnes sibi devinxerat. Omnibus dum vixit, carus, commodus, jucundus Omnibus sui desiderium moriens relinquit. Arti medicae non in auspicato operam navavit, Quam per XL. fere annos feliciter exercuit, Aliis quam sibi utilius. Omnes enim demereri maluit quam merendi roercedem referre. Uxorem duxit Franciscam, Richardi Manley, de Holloway-Court Arm. Filiam, Quae obiit 5. ) die Maij, A.D. MDCCXXIII Aetat (56. llle vero 25. ) (68.

Sara Beaumontii Walrond, Navis Bellicae Praefecti Vidua, Samuelis Conny Filia, Ab eodem Roberto Conny, Haeres ex asse constituta, Patrueli suo optime merenti Moerens posuit. Infra etiam jacet Elizabetha Conny, Sacrae praefatae Soror charissima. Quae obiit 2 die Aprilis A.D. MDCCXVIL AEtat. 49.

[Translation] Deposited beneath this spot are the remains of the distinguished Robert Conny, who was honored at the University of Oxford with the degree of Doctor of Medicine and was enrolled Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians in London, only son of John Conny, a surgeon, and twice Mayor of this city, and grandson of Robert Conny, of Godmanchester in the Field, Huntingdon county, Gent. Throughout his life he was beloved and esteemed by all, and now when dead he is deservedly lamented; for he was a man who by his integrity and purity of life, as well as by his generous nature, hospitality, and attractive manners, bound every one to himself ; and at his death all felt a sense of personal bereavement. He applied himself diligently to the art of medicine under the most favorable auspices, and practised his profession successfully for almost forty years; but more usefully for others than profitably for himself, as he chose rather to deserve well of every one than to reap a recompense for good deeds. He married Frances, daughter of Richard Manley, Esquire, of Holloway- Court, and died May 25, 1723, aged sixty-eight years. She died May 5, 1723, aged

14 fifty-six years. They had no children. This monument was erected in honor of her most worthy cousin by Sarah, widow of Captain Beaumont Walrond, of the Navy, and daughter of Samuel Conny, having been constituted by the said Robert Conny his sole heir. 13 On 21 June 1721, Mary Crow, widow of Richard, re-leased Holloway Court to John Martin; her lease was from Robert Coney. He sold the property to Thomas Pearce, a commissioner of the navy, whose three sons Thomas, Best, and Vincent Pearce, sold it to John May [I] of Birling. Pearce had been made a commissioner in 1714 at the accession of George I; between 1730 and 1742 he was a Rochester Bridge Warden and Assistant, but no other local references have come to light. John May died in 1760, passing the estate to his son John (1734-1805). The latter rebuilt the house in the late eighteenth century and the only known picture of it (now lost) was taken to America by visiting Tilghmans. John May [II] was very wealthy, but had no immediate family, so his estates were divided between four trustees, one of whom was his executor Edward Wickham. In 1819 Wickham sold the Holborough estate to Thomas Poynder and William Hobson, limeburners, and the subsequent history of the house and estate belongs to the emergence of the local cement industry (described later).

John May of Holborough (1734-1805)

Some Early Inhabitants Holborough was just part of the Manor of Halling, owned by the Bishop of Rochester as Lord of the Manor, and confirmed by the Domesday survey of 1086. The so-called demesne land belonged to the Bishop and supported his household. Tenants could rent this, but were obliged to provide services and even food for his table when asked. Other parts of the land might be freely owned by the tenants without providing service, or be common to the parish of Snodland, where poorer parishioners could cultivate their own small strips of land or keep their animals. A map of 163414 (updated again in 1731) shows the extent of the Bishop’s demesne land for which tenants had to pay rent. The earliest names to appear date from the later 1200s; among them are the families of Canon and Usher.15

13 [Joseph Williams], A Brief Study in Genealogy, Connin, Conny, Cony, Coney, by one of the family, Cambridge, 1886; the memorial is transcribed in John Thorpe, Registrum Roffense, 1769. 14 Shown on the inside cover of E. Gowers and D. Church, Across the Low Meadow: a History of Halling in Kent, Maidstone, 1979. There is a photocopy in Snodland Millennium Museum. 15 For further family details see www.snodlandhistory.org.uk under ‘genealogy/snodland parishioners’/ 15 Canon. Members of the Canon family were here for some 300 years – and daughters ensured that descendents continued after that, although under other names. The earliest known was Ralph Canon (fl. 1299-1330), but we cannot trace many others before the mid 15th century: Walter of Halling (d.1442) – Henry (d.1454) – Walter of Halling (d.1486) – Roger of Halling (d.1492) – William (d.1544). There were other brothers too, of course, each with their own families They farmed a few acres, but were not great land owners. It is difficult now to place which land they tilled – virtually all the names fell out of use well before the ones which have come down to us with the tithe schedule of 1844 – but like all their contemporaries they neede to hold or rent a mixture of arable, marsh, meadow, and wood land. Descriptions occasionally give clues: ‘Beggars Bush’ had The Chapel of Upper Halling to the North, but where were Boydens/Brydens, le Lampytt, Lurkylond, Sheppecotte, and Woodcock Down? Dozen or so plots have names which have come down to us: Blackman’s Dean, Catsbrains, Highlands, Ladds, Northmead, Redland, and so on. Usher. The Usher family was more prosperous than the Canons, and ws here even longer: the name appears in documents between 1299 and 1679, and crucially land which they owned is shown on the 1634 map of the Manor. The main line of descent was William (d.1445), Walter and Thomas (d.1472), John (d.1522), William (d.1545), John (d.1561), William (d.1608) and Allen (d.1611).It is presumably Allen’s son or grandson John who is names on the 1634 map as renting 64 acres in ’10 parcels’, on which he took out a new lease for 16 years in 1632. The map also shows a ‘widow Usher’ holding a plot of land outside the Bishop’s demesne. For a considerable time the Ushers occupied a house called ‘Lamkyns’. This is probably the same ‘Lambyns’ which Geoffrey Alisander bequeathed to his daughter Katherine in 1471, or to his brother William should Katherine die. Perhaps both did die, for the next year the will of Thomas Usher left ‘Lamkyns’ to his wife Elizabeth and then to his son John. The property is mentioned in the wills of succeeding Usher generations up to William (d.1545), but he lso owned four other houses, including one which ‘standythe nye unto the myl at Holbeg wich I laytlie buylded’. The site of Lamkyns cannot be identified, but ‘Lamkyns style’ is mentioned in local documents. Taylor. The first Taylor appears here during the latter 15th century and family members settled in Halling and Holborough for the next 200 years. With names like William, John, and Henry, continually repeated it is difficult to sort out a reliable family tree before about 1550. A deed of 1569 shows Alice Taylor occupying a house and 22 acres in Snodland, which her two sons John and William released to her and to their brother Henry. Subsequent deeds in the same group introduce us to the Kentish system of gavelkind, where by the estate, when there was no will, passed in equal portions to sons. So some Taylor descendants claimed a third or two thirds of the estate and later other claimed a ninth part. Sales had to be negotiated with all the interested parties and it was not until 1674 that £130 was paid by John Marsham to add the small-holding to his portfolio. This allows us to identify the property as what was later called Gilder’s Farm, sold by the Marshams in 1808 to John Goodhugh.

16 Holborough in 1844 showing the tithe apportionment numbers.

17 The hamlet of Holborough

The Tithe map of 1844 shows that Holborough then was much the same size as the village of Snodland and remained so until the vast growth of the latter from the mid- nineteenth century onwards, created by the expanding paper and cement industries. The main road to Rochester forded the stream at Holborough and then turned in front of tho mill before eventually joining the present alignment again at the Halling- Snodland boundary. In 1850 William Lee applied to 'improve' the route 'by making the Road thro' the Blacksmith's Forge and across the Field in front of Mr. Lee's residence' - the line it still takes. Holborough must have been very picturesque in its heyday, for the houses were mostly very old. But the nineteenth century was not 'conservation-conscious' and many of them had been demolished by around 1900. The hamlet is small enough to consider the history of each house in turn, so far as available evidence shows.

'Gassons'. When John May of Holloway Court devised his charities in 1800, he specified that a £20 annual rent charge 'issuing out of a ... tenement called Gassons with the lands thereto belonging, containing fifteen acres in the parish of Snodland, payable every 5th day of January' be paid to the churchwardens of Snodland, Hailing and Birling 'to the intent that the respective churchwardens should annually lay out sums annually received by them in the purchase of great coats for such poor persons, being inhabitants of the said several parishes but not receiving parish relief, shall deem the fittest. Gassons is mentioned again in his will, with its 'barns, stables, outhouses, edifices, buildings, yards, gardens, lands and appurtenances lying ... in ... Snodland ... and late in the several tenures or occupations of Thomas Beech, John Goodhew, William Gorham, John Loft, John Hawkes and James Bowyer ... or ... their assigns or undertenants.' Together with the Holloway Court estate, ownership of 'Gassons' descended to Edward and Elizabeth Wickham before being purchased by Poynder and Hobson in 1817. In 1846 it came to William Lee and a schedule16 gives more details: A house, two barns, stables, garden and orchard; 3 pieces of land together adjoining Barrow Hill: about 51/2 acres; 1 piece called Lads: 3 yards; 1 piece called Cat's Brains: 1/2 acre; 1 piece called Care Croft: 4 acres, 1 yard; 1 piece in a field called Mill Field: 3 yards; 1 piece of meadow land in the Marsh: 11/2 acres; 1 piece of meadow land in Northmead; 'together with the usual carrying way there from a place called Hulburrough through the place called Barrow Hill as the same has heretofore used unto the said three pieces of land adjoining to Barrow Hill; 1 piece in a field called the Underwotten: 21/2 rods; 2 acres in Stony Field, afterwards divided and fenced off. The tenants are named as formerly William Huggins and James (probably a mistake for 'Thomas') Parsons, afterwards Robert Widgeon [Vigeon] (d.1719) and J. Gaskin, then Thomas Beech and the others detailed in May's 1805 will; after them Edward Wickham, James Bowyer and John Loft; then after Edward Wickham, John Loft, James Martin and John Goodhugh (with the last two pieces formerly Thomas Parsons,

16 KHLC: U2012/E9 18 then Robert Vigeon, then Henry Robins, then John May, then Edward Wickham. In fact the list enables us to trace a duplicate in a deed of 1710,17 when the tenants are again named as William Huggins [of Birling] and Thomas Parsons: a Thomas Parsons was buried at All Saints in both 1694 and 1714. Ownership in 1710 was transferred from Richard Parker of Snodland, joiner, to William Pound of Snodland, yeoman, but only the land and not the house is mentioned. Comparisons of some field names in surviving documents point to the Usher family as likely owners or tenants in earlier times. It is usually the case that a name like 'Gassons' derives from one of the tenants. The clue in the above lists would appear to be 'J. Gaskin'—experience shows that lists of this kind are notoriously inaccurate regarding spellings and correct Christian names— who can probably be identified as the Thomas Gason/Garson, a labourer 'of Holborrow' named in the manorial records from 1716 onwards and who was buried at All Saints on 16 June 1754. (Robert Vigeon had died in 1723.) 'Gassons', then, was a small holding with several pieces of land near Holborough, but it has never been clear which house was involved. But by a process of elimination, surviving documents point strongly to the tenement being that later called Court Cottage. John Loft, incidentally, was kindly treated by John May, who in his will left him a pension of two shillings weekly and allowed him to 'live in the house in which he now resides rent free for and during his life'. Loft died in 1819 at the great age of 89. His wife Ann lived on until 1836, but apparently she moved to another house after

her husband's death. Court Cottage [tithe no. 142]. This house which was furthest to the north at Holborough is clearly old, although now much altered. The present site seems curious, but this is because it was on the east side of the original main road. Between about 1819 and 1847 it was the home of William Peters, manager of the new cement works of Poynder and Hobson. After a short period of farming in Halling he created the Peters cement works at , said to have been the largest cement works in the world at one time, and which descended to his sons and grandsons. In Court Cottage from the South East later years the cottage was the home of various servants working at Holloway and Holborough Court. [Tithe no. 143]. The map shows a 'garden' plot, which, we can be reasonably certain, was the 'land whereon a Messuage, Barn, Stable, and Outhouses were formerly standing and burnt down by fire and was formerly called the Buck's Head', which is mentioned in the schedule of William Lee's 1846 purchase. No record of the fire has been found, but 'the Bucks head at halbergh with garden and c.3 acres of land in Halling in the tenure of Richard Hills' was among properties formerly belonging to Thomas Clottery in 1631 and sold by Humphrey, Elizabeth and Thomas Williams in 1650. [Tithe no. 144]. Next was a 'House with stables, outhouses, gardens, backsides, etc.', which can be traced back to at least the 17th century. James Wyborne, married in 1688,

17 KHLC: in U1436/T2. 19 lived here until his death in 1723, when ownership passed to Richard Lewis junior (of Cuxton?). In 1729 ownership passed to Thomas Johnson of Cuxton, who died the next year, leaving it to his brother William, who in 1759 passed it to Edward Jupp. Edward had served a seven-year apprenticeship to David Seamark as a carpenter, in Halling, probably sometime before 1740, when he married. Nicholas Hadlow seems to have moved into the property in 1752 from Birling and was still in residence in 1759, but we do not know his occupation. When Edward Jupp died in 1772 it descended to his sons Edward (1742-?) and William (1746-1837). It is William who continues in the property as a carpenter, but his brother Richard (1776-1846) plied the same trade. At William's death the property was acquired by Richard Gowar, (1785-1861), a fruit- farmer from Ham Hill, and the house became a beer-shop. Around 1852 William Lee acquired it, but then leased another property to Gowar,18 who converted that to what became The Rising Sun, managed in turn by his son Ambrose and son-in-law Henry Hawks. The present property had been demolished by 1867. Tithe nos. 145-147 and 153 were all part of property received by William Lee by exchange with Constantine Wood, who had been bequeathed them by Thomas Whittacker. No. 145 was the home of the blacksmith, whose forge was at No. 153 and the other two properties were inhabited by agricultural labourers. Evidence is sparse, but it is likely that Thomas Efford (1765-1821) and his wife Mary (1767-1844) lived here for a considerable time, since Mary is assessed for the taxes recorded between 1822 and 1828. Two of their sons, William (1811-1881) and Samuel (1819-1892) had taken over in 1846, but again the whole property had gone by 1867. Forges at Holborough Two forges are known to have operated in Holborough, but records are sparse until the 19th century and often it is not clear which of them the blacksmiths actually worked in. In 1470 William Alisander bequeathed to his son Geoffrey 'all iron-work and other instruments which I have in the forge of Robert Permenter'. The next identified blacksmith is George Mumford, who was active from around 1630; he was dead by 1662. The forge opposite the mill (tithe no. 153) was actually linked with the house at tithe nos. 151-2, which became a grocer and baker's shop for a time, while the other was sandwiched between tithe nos. 156-7 and 158-9 described below. Around 1700 Richard Rowe/Roe was the Holborough blacksmith and a William Wars is also mentioned. Rowe died in 1721. William Pack/Peck and Jonathan Peachey (d.1779) of Halling were also blacksmiths active during the eighteenth century. However it is likely that the first of a succession of blacksmiths called John Phillips took Rowe's place: John [I] died in 1733, leaving all to his son John [II]. John [III] (1760-1793) also had a son John [IV] (1784-1826) who married Frances Fairman in 1805. At his death she is listed as a blacksmith herself for a time, although she presumably had help too. One assistant must have been William Hewitt (d.1856), the son of James mentioned later. Another was probably William Phillips, her husband's brother (1787-1854), and then her son-in-law Laurence Knell (1824- 1898), who had married her daughter Sarah in 1851. Blacksmithing cannot have been very lucrative, since both William and Frances were declared bankrupt and Knell died in Malling Union.19 In 1841 tithe no. 149 is described as a shop occupied by Edward Hawks (1800- 1885), a carpenter, although at that time he seems to have lived elsewhere in the

18 See tithe nos 156-7. 19 Perry's Bankrupt Gazette, 27 Jan 1844 (William) and 5 Feb 1850 (Frances). 20 street. At tithe no. 150 was John Fielder (1802-1870), also a carpenter. Tithe nos. 151-2. Title deeds show the forge as belonging to this property and for very many years it was the home of the Philips family and other blacksmiths mentioned above. Ownership is not easy to trace, but there is a deed of 1768 setting up a mortgage on it for Valentine Hatch, a tailor of Maidstone.20 In 1827 it belonged to John Stone of , whose executors sold it to Thomas Waghorn, then belonging to the East India Company.21 In 1840 he sold it to Joseph Hoppe, a prosperous grocer from East Malling, who is known to have run the shop from at least 1837 until his death in 1847. Waghorn probably needed the money to help fund his planned new house in the upper High Street. In his will Joseph bequeathed the property to his wife Elizabeth and sons Charles and James, but it is the youthful Charles Hawks (grocer) and his ilrother Thomas (baker) who were there in 1861. As the sole survivor Charles Hoppe of Larkfield sold the property to William Lee in 1878,22 It was then described as 'the smith's forge, forge with one yard of ground, fronting Holborough Road: shop, parlour, bakehouse and oven, four rooms over and shed and outbuildings.' The whole seems to have been demolished by the end of the century. Tithe no. 154: Mill Stream Cottage (also known as 'Little Holborough') is a fine fifteenth-century house (in which William Lee Henry Roberts preferred to live rather than in Holborough Court). It seems that Edmund Gilder and his wife Elizabeth, after they were married at East Malling on 9 February 1715, moved here directly to establish the 'Cock Inn' Edmund appears in the records serving the community in various ways as churchwarden, assessor of taxes, and surveyor of the highways. He bequeathed his houses to his son John, who succeeded him,23 but when the latter died in 1783 this property was bought by John Goodhugh, a carpenter from Birling. He was the grandfather of Snodland's most famous parishioner, Thomas Fletcher Waghorn (18001850), who spent most of his life in creating a speedier postal service between England and India, especially via the 'Overland Route' through Egypt in the 1830s, before the Suez Canal was built. Waghorn's first wife died young in India and in 1834 he married Harriet Martin from Holborough Mill. Goodhugh remained here for the rest of his life, acquiring 'Gilder's Farm' for £2120 from Lord Romney when he sold it in 1808.24 This was a small- holding of around 22 acres, which can be traced back to 1569 as mentioned earlier. He bequeathed to his son James 'all that Farm House with the Barns, Stables, Outhouses, Edifices and Buildings, Yard, Garden and several pieces of land of c. 23 acres (in Snodland) occupied by William Burgess and commonly called ... the Mill Stream Cottage'.25 James was already the farmer at Rookery Farm, then in Birling parish, so let Gilder's Farm to others. The house was divided into two tenements and remained so until W. L. H. Roberts moved in in 1923. In 1841 the residents were Thomas Hulkes Huggins (1785-1850), a miller, and Thomas Hodges, a carrier, and two agricultural labourers. Huggins was probably a member of the well-known family from the

20 KHLC: U838/T360, dated 24 Aug 1768. 21 KHLC: U2102/T34, dted 6 Dec. 1827 22 KHLC: U2102/T14, dated 13 Nov. 1878. 23 KHLC: will: Dra/Pw14, dated 28 July 1766; he died in 1772. 24 KHLC: U1644/E46. The farm buildings are at Tithe nos. 374-7. 25 TN: PROB 11/1844, dated 22 November 1831; probate 6 March 1835. 21 IL

Medway Towns and his wife Millicent was the local mid-wife. William Lee bought the house and 22 acres of land in 1863.26

Tithe nos. 156-7: The Rising Sun. East of Mill Stream Cottage were two shops, which in about 1847 became 'The Rising Sun', once a familiar sight on the way to Rochester. The exterior hid the fact that this was an old property and it was not until it was demolished that the timber frame was properly revealed. The earliest owner traced is Thomas Oliffe, buried at Halling on 20 April 1720, when it passed to his widow Ann. At her death in 1728 two sons Thomas and George inherited it and in 1732 they passed it to George Courthop, then the miller at Holborough. In 1767 it was acquired by John Gilder who subsequently bequeathed it to his housekeeper Sarah Smith for her life with the provision that after her death it was to descend to John Pankhurst, son of Edward Pankhurst, 'who now lives with me, but if he dies before the age of 24, then the property is to descend to my sister Elizabeth, wife of John Fletcher.'27 In 1783 the property was divided into two parts, occupied by David Smith and Edward Pankhurst. The next deed dated 3 April 1812 is a puzzle. In it John and Elizabeth Pankhurst transfer the property to John Goodhugh and his sister (Elizabeth Fletcher), with Thomas and Ann Waghorn. The description is of one tenement, formerly two, once occupied by Edward Orpin and Richard Austen, but now David Smith and Edward Pankhurst. John Pankhurst died aged 62 in 1809, so are these descendants? In his will of 1831 John Goodhugh left the smith's forge and two messuages adjoining, occupied by widow Phillips and Thomas Huggins, to his granddaughters Ann Munday and Mary Jane Waghorn. The tithe schedule shows Thomas Huggins at no. 156 and the blacksmith James Hewitt at 157, with Mary Waghorn 'of Holborough' as the owner. Presumably she was then living with her mother at Island Cottage. In 1850 she sold it to William Lee 'of Satis House' [Rochester] and he then transferred the lease to Richard Gowar and his wife as mentioned earlier. Richard died in 1861 and his son William mortgaged the property to Ambrose Gowar the following year. In 1868 Ambrose conveyed the inn to his brother-in-law Henry Hawks (1825-1892) and the succession of publicans can be traced until the building was demolished around 1980.

The blacksmith here was John James Hewitt (1784-1859), whose son James had married Rebecca, daughter of Richard Peters in the house next door. James was a master grocer, serving in Peters' shop. This forge was demolished around 1850 when the road was re-aligned, and a replacement was built opposite on the south side of the stream. For a brief time George Large divided his time between the new forge and shop, and then John and Thomas Dowsett were blacksmiths here between 1868 and 1891, while James and Rebecca Hewitt ran the shop. When Woolmer wrote his book on Snodland in 1894 he notes that this 'forge and oasthouse ... are now used for the business of a house-furnisher', so presumably by then all work was done at the other forge. The oast house is shown on the tithe map of 1844, so had been here for some time. The land on which it was built was the subject of a legal battle in 1595 between

26 KHLC: U2102/T12 27 LHLC: will:U30/T39, dated 15 June 1783; Gilder was buried on 21 June. The later documents concerning the property are in the same bundle. 22 JI

Edward Tilghman, eldest son of William (d.1593) and William's fourth wife, Susanna, both of whom claimed ownership. In 1929 W.L.H.Roberts built another new forge on the east side of the main road, where the blacksmith insisted that the horseshoe front be a copy of the forge he knew at . Above the entrance `W.L.H.R.1929' confirmed its' origins.

Tithe nos. 158-9: Grocer's Shop. Within the memory of elderly inhabitants was an old grocer's shop on the east side of the main road, but no picture of it is known. A list of owners and occupiers from 1702 can be built from manorial records and land tax assessments: Date Owner Occupier 1 Occupier 2 To 1702 John Everest [I] (d.1702) 1702-1714 Joan Everest (d.1712) 1714-1725 John Everest [II] 1725-1731 Richard/Mary Tomlin 1731-1738 Bartholomew Russell 1738-1755 Robert Field Edward Orpin Richard Austin 1755-1758 Susanna Latter/Mary Edward Orpin William Smith Tunbridge 1758-1762 Richard Hales Edward Orpin William Smith ?1762-1770 ?Edmund Gilder (d.1770) (Thomas Hubble) 1770-1783 John Gilder (d.1783) Thomas Hubble (d.1797) 1783-1801 Sarah Wood (d.1801) Sarah Wood 1801-1806 John Pankhurst (d.1809) Robert Walker 1807-? William Simmons (d.1806) Thomas Kemsley Robert Walker 1812-1814 Edward Simmons Edward Simmons Robert Walker (d.1814) 1815-1822 [?] ,Martin Ann Smith 1823-1825 Richard Peters Ann Smith 1826-1827 Sarah Smith Richard Peters John Butler 1828-1836 William Jordan Richard Peters John Butler (d.1840) 1837-1839 Jordan and Simmonds Richard Peters

Many of the owners lived elsewhere and do not feature in other Snodland records, but John Everest [I] owned other property in Hailing as well as this house. This

23 JIM

property descended to his wife Joan and then John [II]. The first named occupiers are Edward Orpin, a married (farm) labourer with five children, and Richard Austin. Richard was the son of Robert, who had moved here from and had married Elizabeth Everett (Everest?) in 1729. In claiming settlement in Snodland from the Overseers Richard stated that 'his Father hired a tenement in Snodland of Three Pounds a Year of one Field' as well as another property 'And this Examint lived with the said Father whilst he used and occupyed the said Tenements.28 Edward and Sarah Orpin both livid until 1781, but must have moved elsewhere. In another settlement examination in 1759, William Smith 'now residing at Snodland saith that about 3 years ago he hired himself as a servant for 1 year to Mr John May of Birling' and served the year.29 Although adjudged to belong to Birling he must have remained until 1765, when he rented another farm in Maidstone.30 At one point Richard Hales, publican at the Red Lion, had ownership, but after his death it seems the property passed to Edmund, then John Gilder, already noted as victuallers at the Cock at Holborough. Probably from when he was married in 1759 to his death in 1797, the property became the home of Thomas Hubble, a cordwainer. The Overseers paid him regularly, both for work on paupers' shoes and for taking apprentices. In his will of 1783 John Gilder noted that Hubble's rent was £6. 5s. a year. John left his two houses, some land, and £100 to his housekeeper, Sarah Wood, for her life, and then it was to pass to John Pankhurst, son of Edward Pankhurst, 'who now lives with me', but if he died before the age of 24, it was to go to John Gilder's sister, Elizabeth Fletcher. In fact John lived on until 1809, but had sold the tenements to William Simmons of New Hythe some time before the latter's death in 1806. William's son Edward was bequeathed the property. Nothing is known of most of the succeeding names, except that Robert Walker (1742-1814) seems to have been another itinerant farm labourer; he is buried at Birling. A David Smith is listed as a tenant of John Gilder. By 1823 Richard Peters had arrived with a wife and three children. He was one of three brothers attracted by the new cement industry, as described later. Although often calling himself a limeburner, he gradually expanded into other work. The house became a grocer's shop and he was also a dairy farmer, as well as renting marsh land for the grazing of horses. The other resident from around 1825 was John Butler, but when he died aged 70 at the newly-established Mailing Union, Richard took the opportunity to buy the whole property and land. His eldest son Thomas William Peters became the village coalman, and both men built houses to increase their income from rent. The land surrounding the grocer's shop was large enough to add a terrace of seven houses called Place and a further four behind, called Walgrave Cottages, the names taken from the Surrey places where the Peters family came from. They also built Anchor Place and Hope Terrace in Snodland High Street. Tithe nos. 374-7. In 1838 the Overseers's accounts record `Mr Goodhugh's New House (Guilder's farm) John Wray tenant'. In 1841 the residents were John Wray and his wife Elizabeth, both aged '70', but also John Goodhugh, independent, aged 65, and Frances Capon, aged 30. It seems likely that this John Goodhugh was incapable of managing his own affairs, so in his 1831 will his father John set up a trust providing £40 a year for him from rents, during his life.31 Sarah Capon may have een a carer for him. Around 1848 George Pierson (1813-1872), who had been farming in

28 KHLC: PS/Ma1/183: 2 Feb. 1760. 29 KHLC: PS/Ma1, 174: 3 Feb 1769. 30 KHLC: PS/Ma2, 65: 1 June 1765. 31 TNA: PROB 11/1844. 24 Burham, moved to Snodland, and began building up a substantial farming business. Woolmer's 1894 book shows that Pierson took over the working of Gilder's farm32, although James Goodhugh may have still owned it. Some time around 1850 Pierson also leased Halling Court Farm, spread between Halling (437 acres) and Snodland (82 acres). Pierson remained until 1867, when he retired to Rhode House, . On 7 December that year, at St George's Hanover Square, he married Katherine, the widow of Jame' Goodhugh, formerly farmer of Rookery farm, Birling, as well as of Gilder's farm, who had died in September 1864.33 George himself died on 15 May 1872, leaving an estate valued at 'under £14,000.' Gilder's farm must have been affected by the railway's arrival in 1856, so perhaps once Pierson left it was decided to demolish the farm buildings and replace them with much-needed housing for the increasing numbers of cement workers. So the 14 houses of 'Orchard Cottages' appeared by 1881, but Goodhugh's 'New House' (often called 'White House') remained with them until them were all demolished in the mid-twentieth century.

The Cedars The entrance porch is a later addition

On the west side of the main road the extensive grounds of Holloway Court ran northwards most of the way to the Halling boundary, but there was room for an imposing building called 'The Cedars' beyond the north end. The Cedars is not mentioned in censuses or other documents until 1871, but it does appear on the 1867 Ordnance Survey map, so had been completed by then. The 1871 occupant is Charles Letchford, a cement works foreman, who was sufficiently prosperous to have employed a servant. He soon moved to Princes Cottage (see below) and it then became the home of Henry Raven, the clerk for the works, until he died in 1908. In 1861 Raven is listed as living at an 'Infant School', which can only be the school-like little building still beside Court Cottage and which may have been his (temporary?) home until he moved to The Cedars. The only references to the school currently found are in accounts of the fetes given at Holborough Court annually by William Lee to the children of Snodland, Halling and Burham schools. In 1856 The children of the Snodland and Burham schools [...] formed in procession, and

32 John Woolmer, Historical Jottings of the Parish of Snodland (Snodland, 1894); reprinted at SHS pamphlet no. 3, Snodland, 1997. 33 South Eastern Gazette. When Katherine Hodshon married James in 1849 she was 45 years his junior; the age difference with George was only eight years.

25 In

marched with a great profusion of flags and banners, through the village, preceded by the Birling band, to mr. Lee's residence. Previous to reaching the grounds, the procession was further augmented by the addition of the Holborough Infant School, lately established through the kindness and liberality of Mr. Lee, and the Hailing School, also carrying flags and banners [...]34

The outbuilding beside Court Cottage, presumed to be the ‘Infant School’ named in the 1861 census.

(Photograph © Colin Greene)

Home Farm. Whether or not Gilder's farmyard was abandoned at the coming of the railway, by 1861 `Pierson's New Farm' had been established to the west of the hamlet. It was later known as 'Home Farm', but 'Lee's Farm' in the 1871 census. It was demolished around 2000 when plans for a new cement works at Holborough were accepted. Island Cottage, tithe no. 277 gets its name from being situated between two streams flowing from the former millpond behind. This might originally have been the tenement which 'standythe nye unto the myl at holberg wich I [William Tylghman] laytlie buylded' and which (in 1594), 'nowe devided into twoe dwellinges, ... shall allwayes be ymployed as an Almeshouse to the use of the poore for ever'. Tilghman's first occupants were two young widows, both of whom had been his servants. The earliest extant deed is 1631 and subsequent documents show that the mill owners Island Cottage, beside the water mill retained the power to lease Island Cottage to tenants. On 8 April 1676 Richard Harmer was named as a former occupant, and Thomas Howlett as the current one.35 He was here between at least 1660 and 1682. In 1827, her husband having died, Ann Waghorn, mother of Thomas, moved here until her own death in 1856. No other references to them being almshouses has come to light. In 1863 Island Cottage was conveyed to William Lee and it became part of the estate which eventually was transferred to British Portland Cement.36 Tithe no. 289. It seems likely that this farmyard with its house and outbuildings was orginally the property called Nashenden, a companion to Holloway Court. At the 1841 census William Luxford (1796-1872) and his family lived here and he was

34 South Eastern Gazette, 5 August 1856. 'Holborough' school is included again on 30 August 1858 (South Eastern Gazette, 7 September 1858). 35 KHLC: U30/T20: dated 8 April 1676. 36 KHLC: U2102/T12, dated 1863. 26 described as `Male Servant'. Thomas Poynder [II] was his employer and his will states 'I give unto my Butler and valet William Lutchford commonly called James Lutchford by myself and family if in my service at the time of my death the sum of two hundred pounds as an acknowledgment of his uniform good behaviour and attention ever since he has been in my service and exclusive of the benefits hereinafter given to him as one of my servants.'37 But evidence suggests the bequest may rather have been to William Lutchford, son of this William, for the elder man retired to Halling as a farm labourer in later life, while the younger one continued to serve the Poynders. In 1851 William [II] was with William Henry Poynder (1821-1880) in Snodland, son of Thomas [II], who was Lord of the Manor Thomas [I] had bought the village of Hillmarton, Wiltshire, in 1813, and it descended to his grandson Thomas Henry Allan Poynder (1814-1873), who had acquired the Hartham Hall estate there. This all descended to William Henry after THAP's death and explains why William Letchford is found serving the family in Wiltshire. The 1871 census shows that WHP, unmarried, lived in a small house in Hillmarton with just Letchford and a cook as servants. He paid for a major restoration of Hillmarton church and was buried there on 10 August 1880, although he died at his London house. There is a memorial window to him and to his sister Isabella. Tithe nos. 274-6. The 1634 map shows this small field of 4-5 acres belonging to `John Amos', who is presumably John Amisse, the miller at Holborough. It is not part of the manorial land. No more can be found until it is listed at the death of Thomas Whittaker [I] of Trottiscliffe (d.1753) as part of a messuage, barn, stable yard, and garden/orchard comprising about 13 acres.38 The occupant is given as John Coucher. It seems unlikely that Coucher was the shoemaker called Couche who appears in parish records of the time, since both he and his wife were paupers constantly being supported by parish relief. The Whittaker family were considerable land-holders in the district and Thomas had acquired Covey Hall farm as the largest part of his Snodland property. All remained with the family, passing through Thomas [II],39 Sarah,40 Thomas [III]41 and then to relatives named Edward and Constantine Wood. One occupant was Robert Austin (d.1768), whose son Richard 'said that his Father hired ... a House and Land in Snodland of Mr Thomas Whittaker of Nine Pounds a Year all which he used and occupyed for severall Years.'42 The land had reduced to 4-5 acres by 1782 but remained with Robert Austin's son Robert (1749-1829), a tailor, until 1807, when Edward Wickham became the occupier. He held it until 1815, followed by William Burgess (1816-20) and William Folks (1821). It then was farmed by John Orpin (d.1843), the victualler at the Red Lion, as part of his estate, and briefly by his widow, before being absorbed into Covey Hall farm land. Thomas Matthews quit the Home and Covey Hall farms in 1854 and William Peters (1824-1869), son of the cement manager, took over. Relations of his then lived in the large old thatched cottage, situated where the modern offices now stand. This had been home to tailors and shoemakers in the eighteenth century and stood in a cherry orchard. A photograph and drawings show it around 1870, but it seems to have been demolished soon after, because William Henry Roberts erected an

37 The name also occurs as Letchford, Lutchford, etc. 38TNA: PROB 11/2236 dated 30 May 1856. Servants of 3-10 years were bequeathed a year's wages and those of 10-22 years service were bequeathed two years' wages. 39 KHLC: CCRb/M2; Whittaker’s will does not give details of this holding; TNA PCC: PROB 11/805. 39 KHLC: CCRb/M2; Will: TN: PROB 11/866, but again no details of this property are shown. 39 Died c.1782 according to the manorial records

41 KHLC: CCRb/M4; Will: TNA: PROB 11/1624 (incomplete) 42 KHLC: PS/Ma1/183, dated 2 Feb 1760.

27 iron mission-room here in 1881-2. The Rochester artist William Twopeny made a drawing of the cottage, probably in the 1840s or earlier.

The 'large thatched cottage' photographed in 1867.

Tithe nos. 269-272. This was part of the holdings of John Goodhugh (1745-1834), who came to Snodland as a carpenter. So the field name `Sawpit Field' for tithe no. 269 suggests this is where the village sawpit was sited, although by 1844 it was arable farm land. Goodhugh built a timber- clad cottage near the road, but the building at the rear became known variously as 'Back Row', 'Princes Cottage' and 'Nightingale Cottages' - nightingales are still found at Holborough. The 1634 map shows Thomas Short as the land owner. He had acquired it in 161343 and it passed to other family members later in the century. No further identification can be made until the 19th Princes Cottage with members of Thomas century, when three families are Fletcher 's family in the doorway listed in the censuses. Frances (nhotogranh courtesy of Donald Fielder) Southgate, née Manley, (1773- 1855) although born here was the widow of a London butcher, while the others were blacksmiths: Philips, Knell, and Large. Censuses show that Princfrom the cement works: Charles Letchford (1871); Thomas Fletcher (1891-1911).

When W.H.Roberts built Holborough Court in 1884-6, he probably also added what is somewhat inaccurately called 'Holborough Cottage'. This was a substantial building in Ladd's Lane and included the stables: horses were used both for work and for polo

43 KHLC: U47/45/T48, dated 14 June 1613. 28 matches, on which Roberts was very keen. Matthew Parrington, estate manager for Roberts, was the first to live here, although when he first came in 1880 he lived nearby in Halling. In 1901 his place was taken by Adolph Trechman, his wife, daughter, and five servants. From at least 1893 Trechman had been a co-partner of the cement factory at Whorne's Place, Cuxton, and although aged only 23 in 1891, when he was visiting the Mayor of Stockton, co. Durham, he already described himself as 'cement manufacturer'. He was still working at Cuxton in 1896, when he injured his hand there, but the baptism of his son at All Saints, Snodland, in July 1901 and his listing in Kelly's Snodland Directories in 1903 and 1905 show he had transferred here. By 1911 the family was living in Rochester and Holboro' Cottage was rented to Ada Chamberlain, a lady of 'private means'.

Cement-making at Holborough The Holborough estate of John May (d.1805) was bequeathed to Edward Wickham, who in September 1819 sold it to Thomas Poynder and William Hobson.44 This firm had been active for many years. Poynder, son of Thomas of Wootton, Hampshire, deceased, was apprenticed to Edward Wix of the Tylers and Bricklayers Company on 21 January 1765 and married Wix’s daughter Mary at St Peter’s, Cornhill on 7 November 1775. They traded as Wix and Poynder until the former’s death in 1787. Poynder and Hobson, coal and lime-merchants, had premises in Scotland Yard, where a serious fire occurred in 1816. By 1823 Poynder, with his son Thomas, and Hobson were trading as lime-merchants and co-partners from buildings in Earl Street, Blackfriars. For some years the younger Thomas lived at Holloway Court, Holborough, to oversee the workings. A map of 1823 shows ‘Mr Poynder’s House’ as well as the growing chalk pit and waste.45 His daughter Frances was baptised at All Saints in 1829 and later all four daughters donated a window to the church.46 Thomas Poynder senior died in 1837, by which time he was extremely wealthy and living at Clapham Common. He remembered his friends William Hobson and Edward Medlicott with gifts of £10 each for memorial rings.47 A contemporary account of Halling says that ‘Chalk abounds, and the works for burning it into lime provide the chief occupation of the inhabitants; the lime used in building Waterloo and London bridges was brought from Halling’.48 Hobson was born in Southwark on 9 November 1752, married Ann Rickman in 1779 and they had 16 children. Hobson built the family home called Markfield at Tottenham, where, on a visit in 1806, the artist John Constable made sketches of the daughters. In 1805 Hobson became the main contractor for building the Martello Towers on the

44 KHC: CCRb/M4, 27 October 1819. 45 KHC: Q/RH2/181. 46 Unfortunately destroyed by a land mine in 1942 and no description survives. Phelps said it was the work of [Joseph Hale] Miller. 47 TNA, PROB 11/1829/27. He bequeathed £36,350 in his will. The Snodland rector, Henry Dampier Phelps, was also bequeathed a £10 memorial ring. 48 Samuel Lewis (ed.), A Topograhical Dictionary of England, 7th edn., 1848, ‘Halling’. Both bridges were designed by John Rennie, but Waterloo was opened as a toll bridge on 18 June 1817 – too early for the Halling works to have been involved. The replacement London Bridge was opened on 1 August 1831. 29 South Coast and he also helped build Newgate Prison and Thames Docks. He made his fortune through involvement in brick-making, lime-making and brewing enterprises.49 He died, aged 87, on 23 May 1840 and is buried at All Hallows, Tottenham. His will mentions his part in ‘all the Chalk Pits, Buildings, Erections, Lands and Ground situate at Northfleet, Snodland and Hawling in Kent.’ Over the years the firm acquired more land and property around the Snodland-Halling boundary: 50 acres in 1821, 3 acres and several cottages in Upper Halling in 1826, a messuage and land ‘called Rumsey’s Field’ in 1834, and another 22 acres in 1840.50 On 26 October 1842 the manorial meeting recorded that ‘The property which formerly belonged to Poynder and Hobson now belongs to Thomas Poynder and Edward Medlicott.’51 Evidently they soon decided to put the works up for sale and an advertisement appeared in the Times of 18 May 1844: To capitalists and others.—Freehold Estates, in the county of Kent, on the , between Rochester and Malling.—To be sold, all those valuable estates, situate and lying in the parishes of Halling and Snodland, containing the finest gray chalk in great abundance, with 14 lime kilns, wet dock, wharf, and every convenience for manufacturing gray stone lime of the best quality, and the trade accruing from the same; together with a good family residence, gardens, stabling, coach-house, and agent’s house, cottages, barns, and farm buildings, comprising in the whole upwards of 300 acres. This very desirable property has an extensive frontage to the river Medway, and possesses the greatest capabilities for carrying on a most extensive trade; and the proprietors are willing to treat at the same time for the disposal of their several Wharfs and Establishments on the river Thames, Regent’s Canal. Grand Junction, Paddington-basin, &c. For further particulars apply to H. D. Warter, solicitor, 1, Carey-street, Lincoln’s Inn.

The younger Thomas Poynder lived on until 1856,52 but had moved to Wimpole Street, London. However his son William Henry stayed in Snodland for a time as Lord of the Manor, but had to vacate Holloway Court for William Lee and his family. In 1851 he was lodging at Waghorn’s former house in the upper High Street. Poynder and Hobson/Medlicott leased a little land from the Bishop and Dalison, but about 260 acres was in their own ownership, spread through Snodland and Halling, with a further 220 acres leased from the local landowners Cornelius and Edward Wood. Their works was certainly the largest in the district for the time as well as one of the earliest. It is interesting to see that Thomas Poynder is recorded as the occupier of all their estate in Snodland, but ‘William’ [recte Edward] Medlicott for all in Halling. Maybe this simplified the paperwork. The works themselves were all in Halling parish. By the time the tithe schedules were made in 1843 and 1844 there were two separate operations: the main one with a pit and works on the Snodland-Halling boundary, and a second from a site south of Halling church with its own pit to the west. There were smaller pits at Upper Halling, but at least some of these were probably for lime for farmers to spread on the land rather than commercial use.

A key figure in Poynder and Hobson’s/Medlicott’s operation was the ‘Conductor of the lime works’, William Peters. His name is first seen in the Churchwardens/Overseers accounts of 1822 as a tenant of the firm. Earlier lists are less detailed, so it is quite

49 Information from Henry Raeburn painted William and Mrs Hobson; the paintings are now at the Victoria and Albert Museum: see to view them on-line. 50 KHC: CCRb/M4, recorded on 24 October 1821; 25 October 1826; 29 October 1834; 27 October 1840. 51 Ibid Medlicott had been a manager with the firm from at least 1823 – in their London offices.. 52 Will: TNA, PROB 11/2236/63, dated 4 July 1856. 30 likely that he was appointed as early as 1819 when excavation began. He was born in Aldgate in 1793, the son of William and Mary Peters from Dorking.53 Although no firm evidence has been found connecting the Dorking Peters with the local lime industry it seems very probable that they were involved with it in some way, especially in view of the son’s later career. Dorking lime was considered the best of its kind and was greatly used as London expanded. No doubt Poynder and Wix/Hobson made much use of it and found the manager of their Grey Lime Works in so doing. An advertisement in 1833 shows W. Peters as their principal agent when he ‘begs most respectfully to inform the Agriculturist, Farmers, and the Public in general, he is ready to supply lime at “very low prices”’.54 He offered Flame burnt Grey Lime, Flame burnt White lime and Tunnel burnt Grey lime at a scale of prices depending on where they were to be delivered: ‘At the works, at Maidstone, at , or at Tunbridge’. Clearly barges were the means of transporting the product.

In fact other sons of the elder William also made their way to the Medway valley and one suspects that William the younger may have found jobs for his brothers. In later years Richard Peters (1792-1881) was a dairyman, grocer and proprietor of houses (censuses of 1841, 1861-1871), but the earlier references in the church registers (from 16 February 1823) list him as a lime burner or labourer (as does the 1851 census). Thomas Peters (1798-1878) too had arrived in time for the baptism of a daughter Ann at Halling in 1824; the church registers persistently describe him as a labourer, but again the 1851 census calls him a lime burner. William Peters lived in the manager’s house at Holborough (tithe no. 142) until about 1846 and presumably moved on when William Lee took over. In his book on the cement industry Major Francis quotes a letter to William Peters dated 9 January 1839:

I will thank you to give me your price for Grey Stone Lime at per ton, delivered alongside wharf where directed between London and Hungerford bridges for the whole quantity required for building the London bridge and Charing Cross Viaduct. The building will probably commence at about mid-summer next and will occupy from two to three years in its construction.55

Francis assumes Peters to be at Burham already, but this seems unlikely. He already owned at least four barges,56 so was able to work on his own account, although it is not clear whether here he was acting alone or for Poynder and Hobson. He did not move far – just to Halling as a neighbour to his brother Thomas – but in the 1851 census he now described himself as ‘Lime merchant and barge owner.’ Joseph Peters aged 22 (son of William) is then described at ‘Lime Merchant’ and presumably was already helping his father. Another son William, at the same address, was a farmer of 20 acres, employing four men (two of whom were probably John and Thomas Peters, agricultural labourers, sons of Thomas). But The Times of 14 September 1850 had already advertised for sale two batches of farming stock at Halling Court and at Snodland Farm of ‘Messrs. Peters, who are quitting the farm[s],’ so the lime business is likely to have remained a priority. Interestingly it was stated that ‘the implements have all been new within three years, and are of superior quality’, suggesting that farming too happened after 1846.

53 John Gooding, The Peters Family and the Medway Cement Industry, privately printed, 2005. 54 Maidstone Gazette, 21 May 1833. 55 A. J. Francis, The Cement Industry 1796-1914: a History, Newton Abbot, 1977, 188. Unfortunately the author gives no sources for any quotations. 56 Providence (1823); William & Mary Ann (1833); Luna (1837); Mary (1838). 31 On 6 April 1852 an advertisement appeared in the South-Eastern Gazette offering for sale a ‘Valuable lime business and premises, and farm, at Wouldham and Burham, comprising

A piece of Freehold Grey Chalk Land, of rare and valuable quality, consisting of 3 acres or thereabouts. Also the leases (being an unexpired term of 25 and a half years) of and in all those extensive and well-known Lime Works, plant, cliffs, pits, kilns, and wharfs; with an unlimited supply of chalk and limestone of the finest quality. Lately in the occupation of Messrs. George Potter and Co. Together with that capital Farm commodious Residence, cottages, and outbuildings, consisting of 275 acres or thereabouts of excellent land, known as Wouldham Hall Farm, in the occupation of Mr. Solomon Brice, at a very low rent, for Sale by Tender. London wharves, in connection with the business, may probably be had, if desired. The vendors are open to negociation [sic] for the purchase …57

Potter had been declared bankrupt earlier that year. Presumably William Peters bought the property, because a further advertisement of 14 May 185358 suggests that by then he had established his works at Wouldham. In view of the fact that these had belonged to Potter, the ‘late Poynder and Medlicott’ reference is to remind readers that Peters had formerly worked for them: To Contractors, Builders, Portland Cement Manufacturers, & others. WILLIAM PETERS, (LATE POYNDER AND MEDLICOTT.) 7, North Wharf, Paddington, AND Wouldham Hall Grey Stone Lime Works, On the Medway, near Rochester, Begs to inform all large consumers of GREY STONE LIME, he can supply them upon the Most advantageous terms, in quantities of not less Than 100 or 50 cubic yards, at the kilns, or delivered Anywhere per barge. Also, Large and Small Grey Stone. London trade directories of 1851 show three local firms all with wharves at Paddington North Basin: W. Peters at no. 7, William Lee at no. 9, and George Potter and Co. at no. 19. At his death in 1867 William bequeathed the firm to his sons Joseph (1829-1876) and Edwin (1842- ) with the proviso that their brother Henry (1848- ) should join them once he had attained the age of 23 years. According to an indenture of 31 December 1846 Poynder and Medlicott’s business and the Holloway Court estate were bought by William Lee for £9245. The Lee family were a well-established firm of builders from Lewisham. William’s father Henry (1764-1837) and his brothers Henry (1794-1867) and John (1796-1866) successfully contracted for some prestigious projects, including the river embankment foundations for the new Houses of Parliament, the Public Record Office, Dulwich Gallery, and the boundary wall of Maidstone Gaol. In 1826 William (1801-1881) became manager of a small lime works at Burham, but was still living in London.59 Satis House, Rochester,

57 The advertisement was repeated on 13 April. 58 Norfolk Chronicle and Norwich Gazette, 14 May 1853 [repeated; also Essex Standard at the same time] 59 At Upper Ground Street, Blackfriars when son Henry died, aged 7, on 23 July 1828, and at Christ Church, Blackfriars when son William John died, aged 7, on 14 December 1831. Upper Ground Street was also an address used by William Peters. 32 was his home at the time of the 1841 census, but he moved to Holborough after buying the estate.

William Lee’s home in Rochester between 1826 and 1843

Lee’s works at Burham, beside the river, with the associated chalk pit. In the 1860s it was taken over by J. Hallett, H. Haynes and W. Margetts, trading as the West Kent Gault Brick & Cement Co.60

The Burham tithe map and schedule of 2 May 1842 shows him occupying a works on the river bank with its pit further to the east. The obituary in the Kent Messenger of 1 October 1881 states that ‘after several years of hard work (his father having died), he became possessor of the lease, and considerably enlarged the works, and developed the business; so much so, that in 1846 he purchased the whole of the extensive business, freehold property, and the works of Messrs. Poynder and Medlicott’. Previous accounts have stated or assumed that Lee left the Burham works on taking up that at Holborough,61 but there are small pieces of evidence that suggest he continued to have at least some interest in it until his death in 1881. ‘Lee’s Lime Works’ continues to be named in the censuses until that year, which might be nothing more than tradition, but the dissolution of a partnership between H. Earle and William Lee recorded in 187162 includes ‘Halling and Burham’ among Lee’s addresses. Burham is also given as the address for the registration of his barge Ann on 27 June 1860. Furthermore, from 1856 William Lee organised several fêtes for the children of Snodland, Halling and Burham

60 Stoyel and Kidner, op. cit., 109 61 Preston, op. cit., 57 and footnote 72. 62 London Gazette, 12 and 19 May 1871. 33 schools in his grounds at Holborough; the logistics of getting the Burham schoolchildren across the river must have been daunting. Lee’s son Samuel (1826-1852) became a director, presumably after coming of age in 1847, but his early death was a severe blow to William. With his marriage to William’s youngest daughter Sarah in 1853, Alfred Smith also joined the firm, which became known as Lee, Son & Smith. Lee’s works in 1867 One product in which Lee’s became heavily involved was in supplying the ‘new cement’ which had been patented by Captain Henry Scott of the Royal Engineers, Chatham, in 1856 and 1857. As an engineer Scott was required to construct fortifications, harbours, and the like, and so experimented to find the best cement for the purpose. Several reports on its qualities soon appeared. Messrs. W. Lee, Son, and Smith, of Upper Ground-Street, Blackfriars, are now manufacturing the improved cement patented by Captain Scott, Royal Engineers […] The firm mentioned has had it for two years under trial, and now confidently recommends it as most excellent for general use. The patentee is Superintendent of Instruction in Chemistry and other studies at the Royal Engineers’ establishment, Chatham, and from him it takes the name of “Scott’s Patent Cement.” For internal purposes this cement possesses many advantages over ordinary lime and hair; it sets with sufficient rapidity to allow the plasterer to follow on with the finishing coat without loss of time; it does not blister, and when applied to a wall never opens in cracks from unequal contraction in drying. It is also admirably adapted for external purposes, for when exposed to the atmosphere it enjoys the conditions most favourable to its strength, and it dries to a light buff or stone colour. It is always of one uniform tint, and in this respect it possesses a great advantage over Portland Cement, as compared with which, there is a saving in the material of 30 per cent., whilst it can compete with it in hardness within a short time of its application. […] As a Mortar or for Concrete it excels the Lias lime in strength, and can be employed at less cost, for it bears a far greater proportion of sand or ballast without injuring its cementitious qualities; and all delay and expense in slacking and screening are avoided. It is also superior to it for hydraulic purposes.63 Lee’s was probably the most important local cement works at a time when Scott was experimenting with his invention and the obvious one to approach. Henry Young Darracott Scott (1822-1883) was a distinguished soldier who rose to the rank of Major- General.64 He served on several committees including that for the Great Exhibition of 1851, becoming its secretary, and he designed and built the Royal Albert Hall in 1866- 1871 and some additions to the Victoria and Albert Museum. His life was dedicated to

63 The Mechanuics’ Magazine, Jan. 2 – June 26 1858, ed. R. A. Brooman and E. J. Reed, vol. LXVIII, 253. See also Papers on Subjects Connected with the Duties of the Corps of Royal Engineers, Woolwich, 1861, 132-158; Newtons’ London Journal of Arts and Sciences, London, 1859, New Series, X, 127-8; 64 Biographical details in ODNB. 34 public service and at his death his estate was valued at £775 only. He is buried in Highgate Cemetery. At Lee’s death in 1881 the works was taken over by his grandson William Henry Roberts (1848-1926), whose father, husband of Lee’s daughter Ann, had died aged only 31 in 1848. The works continued until 1912 when it was one of several local firms who merged to make the British Portland Cement Manufacturers Ltd. It is said that William Lee Henry Roberts fell out with his father at Lee’s works and decided to establish his own firm. We are fortunate that a ‘Mr Todd of Halling’ worked at the factory from 1925 to 1960 and wrote an illuminating account of his time there, now at Snodland Millennium Museum. I quote parts of it here, slightly adjusted: The two basic requirements [for cement] are chalk or limestone and clay or shale. These both occur naturally at Holborough: outcrops of gault clay are next to layers of chalk marl, and Lower chalk. At first the marl was perfect for cement making and no clay addition had to be made at all. The works was built on the east side of what is now the and the first washmills were built two- or three-hundred yards away on the west side of the road, and the marl was dug by hand and fed straight into the Washmill, using small 30-cwt skips to convey it to the mill. The slurry so made was then pumped under the road into two Mixers (large tanks with slow-moving agitators) on the works. The plant was designed as a two-kiln unit and late in 1924 No.1 Kiln begam producing clinker. Two clinker grinding mills were installed and cement production began in 1925. Power for the works was first obtained from two re-conditioned diesel engines driving electical generators. These were German submarine engines left over from World War I and were bought from Albert Batchelor, who had used them in his own works at Halling. Three more were added, but all caused trouble and were worn out, and it was not until an outside source of supply from Maidstone was connected that the works became efficient. Eventually the works was connected to the country-wide grid system via a local sub- station. ... These early troubles led, first of all, to a syndicate of financiers which around 1927 became the Red Triangle Group of cement manufacturers, with works spread throughout England. Around 1923 W.L.H. Roberts had moved into Mill Stream Cottage and the mansion was turned into offices and a laboratory for the new works.65 Mr Todd describes it: The laboratory itself had been converted from the enormous kitchen. This kitchen still retained a lot of its equipment including two cooking ranges, one big anough to roast a pig. There were benches all round the walls with plenty of cupboards and a large kitchen table in the centre. A big skylight in the centre provided light, and in many ways it was ideal. There were several smaller rooms connected with the kitchen, one of which, the game larder, had slate neches round the walls. This was turned into the cement gauging room where test specimens were made and hourly tests done on the cement. Another rooms was the chemist’s office and sitting room. He had a bedroom upstairs. Several other members of the staff also lived in Holborough Court, including the under managers. During the daytime the Court was a busy place, the main rooms of the house being used as offices, etc. At night, however, it was very eerie. ...

65 KHLC: U2102/T29: lease of Holborough Court to Holborough Sydicate, 1925. 35 The Red Triangle Group spent a lot of money on advertising, often taking the front page of the Daily Mail for this purpose. ... They also organised lavish visits to the works and week afer week parties of over a hundred strong visited. The meals given to these parties were very lavish and laid out in the dining room at Holborough Court. The bottles of beer, packets of cigars and cigarettes that were smuggled out on these occasions must have cost hundreds of pounds. In fact there is a detailed account of such a visit by 150 people associated with the Hull Building Trades Employers’ Association, printed in the Hull Daily Mail of 3 July 1929. After an early start with breakfast on the train they were met by charabangs at Kings Cross to take them to Snodland. The party was amazed at the bleaching of the landscape by cement dust. Lunch was served at Holborough Court before they donned red overalls for their visit, led by several guides. The Holborough Works are the most fortunate of their kind in the world, the whole of the material necessary in the manufacture of cement lying close by in quantaties which will last for hundreds of years. The cement here is ready mixed by nature, the only place in the world where this occurs, and obviously it follows that the cost of producing is materially reduced. The party saw the giant navvy snorting and rattling on its fixed platform as it nosed its way into the vitals of the earth, excavating 4½ tons of the precious material is a single dig and emptying its jaws into waggons. Next the raw material is unloaded into tanks, fed by continuous;y running water from the company’s own 75 feet deep well. The lumps are broken down and the coarser matter sifted out, the residue then passing into other tanks and emerging as a stream to all appearances like thick cream. It then flows into huge 30,000 gallon vats: four of them—and a chemist lovingly watches over them to ensure that the mixture is just right, while revolving pins keep the mixture from settling.

Later follow the more adventurous journeys of the material which is pumped up into giamt kilns 202 feet long, and 11 feet in diameter, into which as they slowly revolve, hot blasts of air of a temperature of 2,800 degrees Fahr.are pumped. The material now hardened and strengthened is clay and clak mixture no longer, but cement, and it proceeds to the grinding room entering a combination ball and tube mill. Here the calcined material is reduced to the finest powder. Next the cement is carried by moving belts into the great silos before being bagged ready for the stock-rooms and distributing centres all over the country. A word about these bags, they are an indication of the efficiency and up-to-dat methods of the works. They are made of strong paper, and in one corner is a ventt into which the cement is poured out of the silo. The bag is turned upsode down, and, presto, the bag is filled and tied up in one movement, a wonderful idea which has been patented.

36 So conveniently situated is everything that the inspection of the works was over all too soon, but members reluctant to leave spent some time in one of the laboratories, where it was demonstrated to them that the Holborough cement exceeds even the high standard set by the British Standard Specification of withstanding 325 pounds to the square inch. After this interesting and informative tour the “Red Army” disrobed and had tea at Holborough Court, afterwards embarking for the return journey to London and dinner at the Holborn Restaurant. Here speeches were at the minimum and entertainment at its maximum. ... The Hull party reached Hull again on the return journey in the early hours of Sunday. Some indication that there had been a falling-out between W .H. Roberts and his son William Lee Henry might be read into the will of the father. When he died in 1926 his estate is reported in the newspapers as £8,754, leaving ‘his furniture, plate pictures, etc., at Holborough Court to the person in possession thereof on the condition that he pays £150 a year to Ethel Alexandra Ross, and all his other property to Ethel Alexandra Ross.’ William Lee Henry died two years later on 18 October 1928 and the estate devolved to his nephew John Hollingworth Cook of Royden Hall, East Peckham, on condition that he changed his name to Roberts, which he did. In 1931 the Red Triangle Group folded and A.P.C.M. became the owners of Holborough Works, having previously leased it for a time. By this time the laboratory and offices had been moved to the works and Holborough Court was only being used to house several families of staff members. Alternative accomodation was found for them and Holborough Court was demolished. On 22 September 1932 there was a sale of the ‘remaining furniture and effects’, followed on 3 October by another of the fabric of the building. Mr Todd notes a transfer to Holborough of a manager and chemist from ‘what remained of Lee’s lime works’. In 1936 John Hollingworth Roberts sold the whole estate to British Portland Cement.66

66 KHLC: U2102/T28. 37